Social Impacts of Logging

Social Impacts of Logging

Part III

MOST OF THE forest-dependent local peoples in tropical forests have
lived on their lands for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. The land and the forests
are their most important economic resource, providing them with food, building materials,
medicinal plants and other products to meet their subsistence needs. Their relationship
with the land has formed the cornerstone of many of their societies and cultures and has a
deep significance in their spiritual lives, often representing the past and the future as
well as the present. Because forests are so central to their lives, most forest peoples
have devised ways of forest management which ensure that their needs are met and that the
forest ecosystem is protected.

The negative social impacts caused by industrial logging are all too often overlooked
in assessments of the damage caused by logging, particularly the high numbers of people
affected, the wide-reaching nature of the problems created in people's lives and the
potential costs in economic terms of replacing the lost benefits provided by forests. The land and forests are the most important economic resource for
forest-dependent peoples, providing them with food, building materials, medicinal plants
and other products.

Food security

Logging has had a severe impact on food and other resources which form the
basis of the livelihoods of many forest-dependent peoples. In terms of food resources,
wild meat and fish represent vital sources of protein. A number of studies have shown that
the availability of wild meat has declined in logging areas in a number of forest regions,
including those in Central Africa, Brazil and Asia-Pacific, as logging opens up previously
inaccessible forest areas to commercial hunting and the over-use of wild game. In Central
Africa, research has found that logging roads have made the forests more accessible to
poachers, some of whom are logging company employees, and logging trucks often transport
bushmeat. In Sarawak, data showed that 3806 kg of meat per 10 families was harvested from
unlogged forests, compared with 1240 kg during the first decade after logging, 534 kg
during the second decade, and just 155 kg during the third decade. This is equivalent to a
collapse in annual meat consumption per head from 54 kg to 2 kg from unlogged to logged
areas.139

Fish, another vital source of protein, have also been severely affected by logging. The
large quantities of soil sediments washed away from logging areas into streams and rivers
causes high turbidity levels and siltation, combined with run-off of diesel oil used by
logging machinery and chemicals employed to treat the timber, causing dramatic declines in
fish stocks. By 1987, 59% of Sarawak's rivers were considered polluted and severe
reductions in fish catches were reported by 57 longhouses along interior rivers.140
In Cameroon, fishing has traditionally been a significant part of local subsistence
livelihoods, mostly undertaken by women. In logging areas, there is already damage to
streams and rivers.141 In the Solomon Islands, logging around the Marovo Lagoon
has been so intense that siltation threatens traditional marine fisheries.142
In Cambodia, where fisheries provide 40-60% of people's protein needs, logging is also
becoming a threat to habitats crucial for the survival of these fisheries.143

Besides protein, logging affects other sources of vital daily food too. Numerous
instances around the world have been reported of logging companies bulldozing fruit and
vegetable gardens located in or on the edge of forests and destroying wild fruit trees and
other edible forest plants. These resources are often lost altogether when forests are
degraded by logging. In Central Africa, logging activities in the forest have disturbed
populations of large mammals, such as elephants and great apes, who start to roam more
widely, leading to increased human-animal conflicts and crop-raiding by animals.144

Water

As watersheds are destroyed and rivers become silted and polluted, forest
peoples are deprived of the most vital resource for survivalclean water. Streams and
rivers provide the primary source of potable water. In Sarawak, according to research
carried out by the Worldwide Fund for Nature, "The consequences of raised
silt-load in rivers are far reaching. Upland streams, naturally clear, become turbid
during spates and remain so for longer periods after the water level abates. Rural
communities are deprived of sources of clean water and rural life suffers. In some of
Sarawak's areas, the river water is permanently turbid now".145 In the
Solomon Islands, damage to water sources by logging practices is often the single most
serious issue identified by local women as it has an impact on all aspects of their daily
life.146

Health

The loss of food and the pollution of water sources leads to health
problems amongst forest-dependent communities, with women and children tending to suffer
the most. In Sarawak, in the late 1970s and early 1980s malnutrition became widespread in
the interior due to the decline in wild meat harvesting and the fall in hill rice
production because less land was available for swiddening. In the Brazilian Amazon, a 1994
survey of hunger amongst indigenous peoples recorded high levels of malnutrition amongst
those Indians whose land had been invaded or disturbed by loggers.147

Besides health problems created by a lack of food supply and clean water, diseases have
been introduced by outsiders to forest communities. In Brazil, incursions into indigenous
reserves have resulted in the spread of diseases against which Indians have no immunity,
and this is the cause of more deaths amongst indigenous peoples than anything else.148
In addition, the opening of the forest encourages the spread of diseases such as malaria.
In Papua New Guinea, for example, "logging operations in several provinces are
experiencing intense levels of malaria among both workers and the local surrounding
populations".149

Disruption of local economies

The loss of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) such as rattan, nuts and
resins can have profound consequences on the local economies and subsistence lifestyles of
forest-dependent peoples. Even when these resources are specifically marked to be excluded
from logging, they are often damaged or felled.150 The value of NTFPs is often
overlooked in assessments of the benefits from forest resources. A study of the local cash
economy in NTFPs in Cameroon found that the sale of NTFPs earned at least US$ 1.75 million
in the first half of 1995. More than 1,100 traders, mainly women, distribute these NTFPs.
The study confirms the role of NTFPs as a source of employment and income, not only for
gatherers, but also for traders.151

Changes in social stability

Community values are being undermined and the fabric and integrity of
forest communities disrupted by extractive industries such as logging and by the
subsequent reliance on the cash economy for essential daily products such as food. Social
tensions within and between communities are often exacerbated as a result.

The social division caused by the arrival of large-scale logging is one of the major
negative impacts identified by local people throughout the Solomon Islands, Papua New
Guinea and Vanuatu. The industry has created a new distinction at the village level
between the 'haves' and 'have-nots' based on a sudden influx of cash from royalties or
'sweeteners'. Because of the complex land tenure structures in Melanesia, and the need for
logging companies to identify "landowners" in order to obtain national
government licences to log, negotiations are often based on expediency and restricted to a
few key individuals rather than taking place with all legitimate landholders. In this way,
a few individuals can undermine the whole structure of customary land tenure in return for
cash. Communities rarely see the promised infrastructure developments such as schools,
clinics and permanent roads, other than logging roads.

In Brazil, as illegal roads are driven through indigenous reserves, uncontrolled
colonisation follows, adding to social tensions and sometimes violence. Illegal logging in
Indian reserves usually takes place as a result of deals struck between loggers and
certain individuals amongst the Indian community, resulting in social conflict within the
community and neither a fair return for the timber nor any positive development projects.

In Guyana, as the younger, more employable community members seek jobs in towns or in
the mining and logging camps, the drain of labour not only deprives the communities of
needed hands in agriculture, hunting fishing and cultural activities, but also contributes
to other negative sides of the extractive industries, namely alcoholism and prostitution.152

In Sarawak, as local forest, food and water resources have declined, many forest
peoples have had little choice but to move to towns in search of work, to move into
resettlement schemes, to find jobs in the logging industryor to resist and struggle
to protect their way of life and to regain their rights. Those with little or no education
or work experience have found it difficult to obtain employment in towns; many have ended
up in squatter settlements while some women have turned to prostitution.153
Many complaints have also been reported by those who have joined land development schemes
such as oil palm plantations; they have often found it hard to adjust to formal and rigid
lifestyles and to depend totally on the cash economy. Furthermore, in many cases, the
promises of compensation for lost customary rights have remained unfulfilled.154
Many of those who have remained in the longhouses have had to join the logging industry to
survive. Due to insufficient safety standards, lack of training, long working hours and
pressure, the accident rate has been high.

Women seem to have been the worst affected. As many men go to find employment either in
towns or with the logging industry, a newly-emerging division of labour requires the women
who remain to cope with previously male tasks in the swidden plots and to work harder and
longer hours to collect water and forest products, both of which are scarce because of
logging. In those cases where communities are encouraged to move into settled rather than
swidden agriculture, women tend to be economically and politically marginalised because
they have no relation to the new crops and little access to new information and
technology. Any matter related to land and resource rights in settled agriculture is dealt
with by the government or the private sector through the male household head, pushing
women further aside. As the community begins to place more reliance on male,
non-resource-based livelihoods, it shifts from depending on an integrated community
livelihood system to one based on greater gender differentiation.

Even in those few instances where local communities have had clear contracts to provide
locally-produced timber to foreign loggers at prices attractive to the community, local
communities have still been badly affected. In Guyana, the Orealla community on the
Corentyne River, for example, negotiated contracts with the Malaysian-controlled Barama
Company to supply it with logs at prices three times more than those offered by local log
traders. After one year of shipping 1,000 cu m a month to Barama, the community realized
that the apparently favourable deal was turning sour due to increased transportation
costs, delays in payments, and less time for other productive activities. As a result,
timber species were declining, cash flow was not improving, the quality of diet was
getting poorer and women and children were suffering. Poverty increased and tensions in
the community rose as women complained that basic community maintenance and improvement
activities and farming were being neglected because of 'logging fever'.155

Promised infrastructure: a main river crossing in the Solomon
Islands with total bridge collapsethis only a matter of months since cessation of
logging operations in this area. (See Isabel Timber Company).

Logging deprives people of access to economically important non-timber forest
products, such as those used in weaving.

Opposition to logging

Another major social impact arising from industrial logging is the
potential for conflicts between logging companies and forest communities. In Melanesia,
landholders have caused damage to logging company property as a last resort to get loggers
off their land. In Brazil, an unknown number of Indians have been murdered because of
their opposition to logging in their reserves. Indians have often been forced to take
direct, sometimes violent, action in their attempts to halt the loggers' illegal
incursions into their territories.156

In Guyana, the Amerindian communities found themselves living in forest concessions
without having been consulted. As a consequence, the prospect of conflict with foreign
loggers became a serious issue. Amerindians have already voiced concern about instances of
eviction, resettlement to poorer areas and low salaries (when employed) in some of the
foreign-owned concessions.157

The eastern province of Cameroon has been the country's main timber producing region.
The population comprises Bantu people and some indigenous people (Baka), largely rural
communities who depend on forest products for 95% of their livelihood. Over time they have
become increasingly disillusioned with commercial forestry operations, seeing no benefit
or improvement in their living standards nor local infrastructure.158 As a
result, the local population, logging companies and administrative authorities are often
in conflict with each other.

In Sarawak, meanwhile, the conflict between native communities and the logging industry
has been going on for at least fifteen years. The collusion between the industry and the
political forces has led to the repression of the Dayaks and those who have tried to help
them (see box below, 'Social conflict and human rights abuses in
Sarawak').

NGOs and local communities in a number of countries have established informal
international networks to exchange information and to campaign at local, national and
international levels against the negative impacts of logging companies. These networks are
often the only source of information on companies' activities and provide vital input to
the debate on the protection of forests to local communities, national governments and
international fora in the face of destructive logging practices.

Over 500 Penan men, women and children gathered at their blockade
site near a logging road in Ulu Selaan, Ulu Baram (Sarawak) to protest against the
destructive activities of a logging contractor in their area, June 1991.

Social conflict and human rights
abuses in Sarawak

THE DAYAKS have lodged many complaints to the
authorities about logging-related and land rights problems, but their complaints have
constantly been ignored. Over the years, hundreds of indigenous peoples in Sarawak
defending and protesting against logging, plantations and other destructive development
activities within their customary land and against infringement of their rights have been
harassed, assaulted, intimidated, suppressed and arrested.

Between 1987 and the early 1990s, the native communities put up a series of major
blockades across logging roads to prevent loggers from entering and destroying their
customary lands and forests. These blockades interrupted logging operations throughout the
state. The two most timber productive regions, the Baram and Limbang districts, were
particularly badly affected. During this period, hundreds of natives were arrested,
detained, charged and imprisoned for erecting blockades.

"When I think of our land which is destroyed by the kompeni, it really pains my
body now. Now we can't find wood for our boats. The only wood left are the logs going down
the river, there is none left on the land. They just bulldoze across our lands, now it is
only sand and stones. Is it right for them to do this? What is the meaning of this? This
is my land, my fruit trees. Yet they ask the polis to arrest me?" (Kayan quote)

Native Customary Rights are simply ignored by the private companies. Supporting these
companies' interests, police and forest department officials have arbitrarily arrested and
detained those indigenous people who put up any form of protest, even though such protests
are undertaken within the confines of their own lands and they have legitimate rights
under the law to such forms of protest.

In a number of cases, natives who were arrested and brought to court were subsequently
found to be not guilty. The court decided that the natives were blockading / protesting on
their own customary land, and that defence of one's property was recognised in law. The
Miri Sessions Court found that 42 Kayans of Uma Bawang longhouse community in Baram,
arrested and detained by the police in 1987 for putting up a blockade against a logging
company, had been wrongfully arrested, falsely imprisoned and maliciously prosecuted by
the police. The Court also ordered the police to pay damages and costs to the Kayans.159

At present, indigenous communities are still erecting blockades and protesting against
the timber companies in the interior region of Sarawak. Indigenous communities continue to
face various threats from unsustainable development projects and arbitrary and high-handed
aggression from the authorities. Of particular concern now is the clear-cutting of forests
for oil palm plantations. Over the past 18 months, the Police Field Force has stepped up
its campaign of intimidation and arrest of natives defending their land against
encroachment of logging and oil palm plantation companies:

§ On 13 March 1997, when 75 Penan went to a logging camp to deliver a protest letter
to the head of the logging company, they were met by Police Field Force who started to hit
and arrest them. About 30 Penan were injured and four arrested and severely wounded.160

§ On 17 April 1997, the Police Field Force arrested nine Iban men from Rumah Reggie
for voicing opposition to an encroaching oil palm plantation.161

§ On 25 June 1997, 42 Iban men and women were arrested during a peaceful gathering. In
both cases, the Iban were violently arrested and jailed without warrant or formal charge.162

§ On 19 December 1997, when a violent conflict between unarmed Iban and the Police
Field Force broke out following a dispute with a palm oil plantation company, one Iban
man, Enyang Ak Gendang, was fatally wounded by a gunshot wound to his head (below).163

'We will defend our land at all cost. We will never surrender it. We have our
dignity and we must leave something for our future generations'.164

As a consequence of their resistance, the most vocal indigenous activists in Sarawak
are continuously intimidated and their privileges as citizens denied. Thomas Jalong, Jok
Jau Evong, Garah Jalong and Raymond Abin cannot travel abroad because their passports have
been confiscated. A number of Dayak activists are black-listed by the authorities. Some
lawyers and representatives of Malaysian NGOs from Peninsular Malaysia have been deported
from Sarawak and are denied access to the state (see 'Human rights vs. logging', page
22).

Community development initiatives as an alternative

In a number of countries, communities have taken development initiatives
into their own hands and have shown that both they and the environment benefit. In the
Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea, a number of community timber and resource
mangagement initiatives have been established, suggesting an alternative development path
to the short-term activities of large-scale (often foreign) logging companies. In the
Solomon Islands, the promotion of this alternative looks set to become mainstream
government policy.165 In Sarawak, several resident or longhouse associations
have been set up since 1987 to implement bottom-up development projects designed to
improve peoples' livelihoods while improving and regenerating the environment. The
community of Uma Bawang, for example, has taken development issues into its hands since
1987. The local people have worked together on integrated organic farming, forest
regeneration and plant nurseries, handicraft production, medicinal plant growing, and
educational and cultural activities. In Cameroon, new forestry legislation, which aims to
encourage participation in the management of forest resources, provides for community
forests, which can be exploited by a legally-constituted community entity,166
although the success of this has yet to be tested.

Community based forest rehabilitation using indigenous species at
Sungai Keluan, Uma Bawang.